I feel the need to start off by conceding that I have played the Game of School as described, and I acknowledge that just about everyone else has. And maybe it’s an incurable disease that has infected our education system, stopping progress and pride in one’s work in its tracks. It takes hold in the younger grades, when reading stops being fun and starts being required, when our clock math becomes staring at the slow ticking contraption on the wall, when lessons become paperwork and regurgitation and people start to realize that they can avoid that horrible feeling in their stomach when they answer a question wrong by never answering questions at all. We close our hearts, our minds, our time to education, doing only what is required, looking to the “smart kids”. We label those in the group who excel in this or that and rely on them, never considering our opinions worth exploring. And the teacher nods to the prognosticated answer and moves on.
Perhaps we can’t reverse what sets in when we are young and education becomes something hard and uncomfortable, when our peers start sectioning off and everyone’s not friends anymore, and when group work becomes awkward and forced rather than embraced and enjoyed. But maybe, if we try, we can. By adding little things that are interesting, facilitating open conversation and creating accepting environments, relevant ideas to students, and trying to do a little bit more than required every day, we can change it. Just maybe.
Perhaps we can’t reverse what sets in when we are young and education becomes something hard and uncomfortable, when our peers start sectioning off and everyone’s not friends anymore, and when group work becomes awkward and forced rather than embraced and enjoyed. But maybe, if we try, we can. By adding little things that are interesting, facilitating open conversation and creating accepting environments, relevant ideas to students, and trying to do a little bit more than required every day, we can change it. Just maybe.